2011 BMBS Round 5 - Newnham Park

I went to the UK for the final round of the British Mountain Bike Series with only one single goal – have fun! It had been a long hard season on the road and I was going to go back to my roots (literally) one last time for the year. My season basically ended the week before when I retained my Irish national marathon title (on a course that I really like and find suits me) although since returning from the Belgian racing it had been winding down. Mel was heading over to Newnham park to finish out the series and hopefully claim (which she did) the Elite Women's overall title so I decided to tag along.

On arrival in Newnham Park, we found what was probably the best XC course of any race that we have raced in the UK over the last 3 years. It had everything - tough climbing, super steep climbing, a few drags and then the fun stuff... technical rooty drops, off camber sliddery descents and super fast rollercoaster singletrack that Newnham park is famous for – it was excellent. My interview Mel caught just as I finished really says it all.
 

 So that was that – a really fun end to the season. In comparison to other times racing in the UK, I really saw where I could be a lot faster if XC was my goal – easily 1 to 1.5 minutes (20 minute lap) on the technical terrain and maybe another minute just being used to the grinding power (as opposed to road racing, where I tend to spin) on the climbs. I'm a huge amount stronger now than I was when I last raced there racing well within myself (remember goal number one) – it was great to see after what was a somewhat mixed season.

There is a report on Sticky Bottle

2010 BMBS Round 4 - Dalby Forest

It's 3am, I can't sleep – my mind is racing, my body is shot – what happened.

Dalby forest – a personal history. In May last year, 500 meters from the end of the race I hit a tree stump propelling me through the air and into the ground hard breaking my collerbone. April this year, the World Cup, crash hard on my second lap hurting my leg, hip and back – I couldn't pedal anymore – strike two. Like a jockey thrown from a horse, I had to get on, get right back on, so I did – yesterday we had the fourth round of the British National Series in Dalby.

CRASH – but this time of another kind. Road Stage racing, criteriums, marathons, road races, cross country races – all in the last two months – I had raced in 4 countries (UK twice) in the last 14 days. Something had to give, I thought I had considered it all and rested appropriately, but I hadn't. Pop, crash, bang, whollop – that was me.

The race started with a slipped pedal – no big deal, I sprinted on and 4-5 minutes into the race was in around 12^th position – a platform to work from. That was really it though – the body shut down, the legs stopped, game over before it really began. I hit the major climb on the lap, a steep 3-4 minute affair and pushed hard, my heart rate was pegged but a train of 10 riders rode by me like I was standing still – I couldn't do anything – nothing, climbing is usually my forte – it was tough, physically tough, mentally tougher. I rode on, barely turning the pedals, more riders past and I realized I was barely moving. As I came around to complete the first lap, I was fried, mentally, physically I was spent – the great form I had the previous week was gone – was it too much to ask for a fast XC race only a few days after the hardest race of my season?


Horses, getting back on horses, damn me – I had said before I arrived in Dalby that my only goal was to finish, to not be a DNF. Why did I say this, as I went through the first lap, the smart thing would be to stop, pull in, regroup ,fight another day – I was just destroying myself physically and mentally – I need to save these mental matches for when they count (eh, National hill climb and XC Champs in the next few weeks!). But I must finish – I soldiered on. A few more riders past me, I didn't care, apathy had taken hold with my only wish being for the ordeal to be over. I looked at my laptime as I go through the start/finish – I'm not much quicker than Mel today (usually, on a course like this, there is a 15% difference in our lap times – not so today).

I suffered, I hated it, but I did finish, I got through the race, I didn't crash (or at least, I didn't fall off the bike), no hospital trips and the horse was remounted. It was the slowest I have ridden in an XC race in a few years but I did get through it – my goal of finishing was met. Yeah, I was sick afterwards, couldn't eat and felt the worst I have felt in a long time – but sometimes you gotta latch onto the good things.

Postscript (bike nerdy stuff) – I always race with a Garmin bke computer which really is a treasure trove of post race analysis. The big climb on the first lap, it was terrible – I was climbing it at the same power as I was climbing the much longer climbs the weekend before at the END of the almost 6 hour marathon – I was also climbing slower than when I tootled up them on a practice lap the previous day – despite all that, my heart rate was pegged. There was something seriously wrong during the race – a case of over-raced, over-reached or sick. Afterwards, the only thing I could stomach for several hours was a can of coke – a thing that usually turns my stomach.

The next week is rest, pure unadulterated rest, well, if I can ever fall asleep...

2009 Ballyhoura Screamer MTB Stage Race

This may have been my 'off-season' but I have still ended up racing some sort of event every weekend. My training between events (more exercise actually) was just the Tuesday night cross training sessions and maybe another 1 or 2 MTB rides - nothing that resembled a structured plan.

Anyway, I heard about the Ballyhoura Screamer a few weeks back. It is basically a two stage MTB race held on Ireland's largest trail center (Ballyhoura) on Halloween night. They promised a carnival atmosphere and that is exactly what we got.

The first stage was a 32km cross country loop utilizing many of the purpose built trails (mostly the brown loop). Things were going well until about 10km to go when I had a slight crash, my first racing in a long while, and punctured my front tire. Luckily, despite a lot of stopping to re-pump the wheel and the use of a few CO2 (thanks Mick Jordon) cans I was able to scrape around to take the race lead.

After a chicken curry with rice (well, more like a veg curry – they were stingy on the chicken) with the other MAD racers and we were back for the night time-trial. All the kids that were present for the family events congregated around the start ramp creating a great atmosphere. As I was in the lead, I started last (to a smaller crowd) but had great fun bombing around the 9.2km singletrack loop setting the quickest time and claiming the overall.

The racing etc... was great, but the main thing about this event was that it was a relatively low key introduction to racing. I had not seen 90% of the people down there before at races – baggie shorts, flat pedals and lots of nerves where the order of the day. I hope that this event has snagged a few more riders with the racers bug I caught a few years ago.

Thanks to everyone for putting on such an inclusive event – there was something for everyone there from the people who raced the event in a little over two hours to the folks that took over four.

Results are up here, and a selection of photos here.

2009 K-Capital Challenge Round 3

After the Newnham races I officially went into "off-season" mode, or as some like to call it, "non-competitive" season. For me, I guess it is the off-season as the following week I took part in the final round of the K-Capital Challenge series.

Unfortunately, due to other commitments I missed the first two rounds. The events are a little different from the standard XC races as they are mass start for all categories and based on either one or two laps with the winning Elite rider finishing after 1.5-2 hours.


The final event was being held in the beautiful surroundings of Kippure House, home to the 2008 Marathon Championships. Luke Manning (and a bunch of others) put together some amazing new singletrack on the western Dublin mountains, an area of the Dublin and Wicklow mountains that I severely ignore (not any more!).

James McClusky

At 12pm, 140 riders left Kippure house for our 28 kilometer route. We kept the pace neutralized until we finished an initial road section and headed into a fireroad climb. Almost immediately, Matthew Adair attacked - I jumped onto his wheel and towards the top when he started to slow, I jumped onto the front to push the pace. I entered into the virgin singletrack in the lead but made a few mistakes and watched Robin Seymour and shortly afterwards, Joe McCall, ride by. As I rode the singletrack, I forgot I was in a race and simply enjoyed riding my bike in the woods. After lots of amazing trails, Joe and I were riding together and I judged Robin to be about 30 seconds up. After a very steep (but short) climb, I kept the head down to bridge over to Robin - half way up the main road climb I made it to him and we crested the hill together. I let a gap open on a rocky descent and followed that up with a few poor line choices (all new trails to me) and by the time we hit the final long climb, I was again around 30 seconds back. The head went down and I pushed to the top of the climb entering the final singletrack ahead. As soon as I entered though, I made a wrong turn (oh, I wish we had multiple laps of this course) and Robin passed me for the final time. I tried to stay with him but a gap opened. Half way down, I took a wrong turn (in this case, lots of people did - the only ambiguous place on the complete loop). Knowing that Joey was a couple of minutes back I took the time to enjoy the final section and finished a little over a minute behind Robin.


The event was ran to perfection on great trails - I would love to see a marathon even held there over a couple of laps of that course.

Results are available here.

Thinking of the 2010 Cyprus Sunshine Cup

After the amazing experience Mel and I had at the 2009 Sunshine Cup, we have already signed ourselves up for the 2010 edition. This year, the event will be slightly shortened cutting out the inital Point to Point race (a 45km course with 1600m of climb) but running that race a little later in the year. The other events, thankfully, remain the same. So basically, fly over for 2.5 weeks, get two C1 XC races and another S1 Stage Race in the middle.

The thing I'm looking forward to most is the 45 minute single track climb to the clouds that is followed by a 12 minute rollercoaster single track descent back to the start - that is part of the point to point race which is the second stage of the stage race.

A few days ago we also go the following photos from one of our friends from Cyprus - Savvas. Thanks for the pics!

The time trial (part of the stage race) was the only wet race

Mel in good company

60-90 riders in the Elite Male races meant frantic starts

2009 Marathon World Championships

Every time that I have pulled on the green (and this year, really really green) jersey to represent Ireland it has been something special. In my short cycling career I have not done this many times (yet) but each time it means a lot to me. To top all that, heading to a World Championship, with all the big name riders sporting their countries flags is something to cherish. With all that in mind, Mel and I headed to Graz in Austria for the 2009 Marathon World Championships.

Course Profile

With 3810 meters of climb spread over 104 kilometers of fireroads, single track, river beds, grass and tarmac, the course for the 2009 Marathon World Championships looked to be the toughest race of the year. Upon arriving, two days before the big event, the idea that it was a difficult course was backed up by every competitor we met that had ridden the course. An easy way to grasp the course is it think of it as a very technical XC course stretched in both distance and elevation – everything was to the extreme. Even 2007 Marathon World Champion, Christoph Sauser claimed it to be the most difficult marathon course ever – sweet :)

Mel and I arrived at the race venue Friday afternoon (race was Sunday) hoping to get a little easy riding in to help relax our tired bodies from all the travelling. After building the bikes, we decided to ride the first few kilometers of the course. After a couple of kilometers of gentle tarmac climbing we hit the first obstacle, a 1.5 kilometer road climb that averaged 21% and had stretches at 28%. Not exactly easy riding – with the granny gear in use, we tootled up it. After that, we rode the final 2 kilometers of singletrack back to the start/finish – a really fun section of pointy rocks and slippery roots – a section where good balance and the ability to stay away from using the brakes would be key. It was at this point that I knew my S-Works Epic was the perfect bike for the race – indeed, almost all the top riders, male and female rode full suspension bikes for the race.

A flag for every nation there - I was the only Irish

The following day, a Gondola ride (who wants to climb for an hour the day before a marathon race?) took Melanie, Elisabeth Brandau and myself to the highest point in the course, Schockl-Bergstation. From there it was an hour of fun technical riding back to the start.

Mel preps bottles, I prep bikes

Race morning arrived and my legs felt pretty good. A 15 minute warmup had me down for gridding just in time. Unlike last year (dead last), my grid position was amazing – called up 16th. I knew that I would not be beating my number plate (this year) – but to start from the front, rather than the back was nice – especially going into the steep initial climb. The race started at an easy tempo as we rode over to the base of the steep climb and at that point, everyone switched into top gear. Looking around, you would think you were in a 1 hour cyclocross race, not a 5 hour marathon. My heart rate was sky high and I knew that if I pushed too hard, for too long, I would really pay later in the day so I allowed myself to slip back (mistake?). Soon, we were on virgin trails (to me at least) – with the rain the night before some of the sections turned pretty slick and I was having a great time slipping by riders less accustomed to riding in the wet.

One of the really stressful things about racing abroad for Mel and I, especially marathons, is race/feed support – we have none! Mel and I are privateer racers and all expenses are out of our own pocket – getting to these races costs a lot and the support we get from other racers and their supporters means a huge amount to us. At the worlds, thanks to Andy at SportAmed for taking us under his wing. He (obviously) had to support his own team riders first but even taking the bottles to the various locations was a huge help. Andy was helping us, but, as I say, he had his riders to account for which meant that I was either getting a handup from Andy (thanks!) or he left the bottles at the side of the feed zone for us to stop and grab. Now, in a lot of races, the feed zones are pretty civil affairs – not here – it was a chaotic jungle of screams, shouts and bottles flying. It was really amazing but not exactly conducive to finding a bottle at the side of the feed zone! Anyway, during the race, I missed a few bottles, lost contract with riders while I searched for bottles and had to deal with the stress of trying to sort all this out before the start. I said it last year, I'll say it again – WE NEED SUPPORT AT THESE THINGS. A few minutes difference in my race time was quite a few positions. Just having support would have given me this. Anyway...

More big climbs and more super fun descents were on the cards. I had heard a lot about some extreme descents but I didn't find anything too nuts. Sections of off-camber rooty goodness followed by 500 meter long rock gardens straight down the side of a mountain – great fun.


The long climb up to Schockl seemed to take forever but as the climb went on, I actually felt better and better (maybe it was the Guava TorQ gels?). I passed a lot of riders that looked to be paying for their earlier efforts. At the neutral feed at the top I grabbed a Redbull and started the long steep descent. As with all the riding in the day, I cleared all the descents cleanly but there was many a sketchy moment when the front and rear suspension saved me. In training, I would never hit some of the sections so fast, but when you are in a race, especially wearing your countrie's colours, a little go faster bulb seems to go off in my head and I imagine myself riding a downhill bike with full armour (rather than a 9 kilo wippet bike with me in lycra!).


As I entered the final kilometer of the course, I saw a German jersey, a white Specialized Helmet and another Epic – I had caught Mel. She started 15 minutes after me but had a shorter route. I nipped past her on a bend (I had been passing men on the way down the descent and I wasn't finished yet) and told her to hang on to me. A couple of minutes later I crossed the line happy to be finished with Mel following a few seconds later – it was really nice for us to be both over the line at the same time.



My race time was 5:23 which placed be 64th - a little over half way up the field. I had a pretty good race but have a top 40 as a goal for next year (15 minutes faster would have had me there this year).

Many many thanks to our main sponsors, KCNC, Schwalbe, TorQ, Crankbrothers but especially to Cycleways and Specialized for helping us ride the best bikes available.

Results:
Mens Results
1 Roel Paulissen (Belgium) 4:34:37
2 Alban Lakata (Austria)
3 Christoph Sauser (Switzerland)
4 Christoph Soukup (Austria)
5 Wolfram Kurschat (Germany)
6 Alexey Medvedev (Russian Federation)

23 Oli Beckingsale (Great Britain)
64 Ryan Sherlock (Ireland)
72 Paul Oldham (Great Britain)

2009 Specialized S-Works Epic - Race machine

It has been almost 3 months since my new rocket ship arrived at my door – the award winning, 2009 Specialized S-Works Epic, more than enough time for me to form an opinion on it and give a little review – briefly, I think it’s an amazing technical achievement. The mix between rigid rocket and sofa bike is astonishing – It just knows what to do.

For 2009 there has been a massive shortage of S-Works Epics with the Irish and UK supply being sold out long before they even became available. Due to this, my new bike didn’t arrive until the day before I left for for my first set of races in Cyprus. Basically, my housemate, Alan, picked it up for me from Cycleways and I laid hands on it at around 8pm to build up – once built, it was time to pack into a bike bag. I did take a little risk in that I never rode it and I was taking it away to race on for several weeks. Although the suspension had changed significantly from my 2008 version, the geometry was going to be pretty close so I believed that I would feel right at home on it from the start.

Race prepped in Cyprus

Having read a great deal about it on various forums I knew that setting the front and rear suspension correctly at the start was important – in that regard, I watched the various suspension setup videos Specialized has online and spent 30 minutes setting it up – I got it perfect first time around and aside from changing the brain threshold, based on the type of course, I have not altered anything since.

From the first pedal, what got me was the rigidity of the bike – it felt almost like my road bike with every bit of energy going into the pedals. Initially, I was a little worried that I made things too stiff and that when I hit the offroad I would be knocked around a lot. Obviously, the first thing I did was try and find the roughest, most technical terrain I could find and see how it feels. My reaction was, OMG, this feels like my Enduro SL – the suspension worked magically, like riding on a magic carpet – everything from trail buzz to square edge hits were hammered into a smooth ride. It was like a mini destruction crew working just in front of my wheels to make the trail as smooth as possible – just for me, yet when I stood on the pedals, there was a road bike under me – amazing. Another nice thing, the S-Works Frame is naked carbon like last years S-Works Tarmac SL2 road bikes – not only does the frame look sweet (and save about 150grams on paint) but is actually super easy to clean. Important when your racing abroad, cleaning to make it look spotless takes about half the time of last years white Kona.

The front and rear suspension was the main difference with this years bike for me – a lot of the control, drive train (except the new S-Works crankset – very smooth – which I’ll be converting to a double once they become available), wheels etc… was very similar to last years from a performance point of view and has worked perfectly. Racing really is the toughest test of any bike – especially on trails as technically demanding as the ones in Cyprus and I have to say this bike has come out with flying colours. I know it’s really clichéd to say it is the “best bike I’ve ever ridden” – but it really is! It is by no means a cheap bike though at 6,000E, but if you want the best…

Both our bikes ready

Now for the all important bit – what is the weight – well, in the pimped race version with my KCNC components and crankbrother pedals and real tires (not 300gram show bike tires) it hits the 9.2kg mark. Not bad for something built to last under a 73kg rider!

KCNC supplied chains, seatpost, skewers (a new, longer rear skewer is need as the carbon dropouts are pretty wide), stem and bar. Thanks Andy!

Most importantly, thanks to Specialized and Cycleways for sorting Mel and I out with our bikes this year - it is a real privilege to be riding these amazing machines.

Mel has already written a piece about her bike too with lots of pictures here.

Saris PowerTap Disc Brake wheel

This year, Saris were able to help out with a few pieces of equipment through Paligap – the most interesting piece being the new PowerTap SL 2.4 Disc built by Cycleways onto a Stans NoTubes Olympic Rim with Sapim Race spokes which just so happens to talk wirelessly with my Garmin Edge 705. I have used power on the road bike for over a year now and have found it a great training tool – sometimes, I do admit to riding t o a number (which is good sometimes) but the advantages for training specificity, pacing and training/performance recording has been immeasurable. With all that in mind, I was always intrigued to see what the difference would be off-road versus on the road. With a few weeks of training and an offroad time trial on the wheel I can start making some initial observations.

Full built wheel including brake rotor and rim tape is 1,250 grams

Firstly, mountain bikings power profile is dramatically different from the road. Looking at a road power file, you see power rise and fall a lot, this is nothing in comparison to what you find on a mountain bike. The amount of time that you spend at Anaerobic power levels is astonishing with the time spent around Threshold power levels being dramatically lower (unless of course there are long steady climbs in the ride/race). My observation is that you are basically coasting (steep or technical descending), riding at endurance pace (fireroad descending) or are at VO2max/Anaerobic Power Zones (all climbs).

A muddy one

Throughout the winter I spent a great amount of time training for increased power at Threshold/Tempo and increasing the time I can spend at it – it works well for the road but the power requirements for off-road are quiet different and something that I will be altering my training for.

For instance, if you take two rides, one on the road and one off-road that you would consider equally hard on your body, the MTB ride would have a much lower average power, but with a lot higher peaks. Also, generating the same power off road is much more difficult than on a nice smooth road.

Secondly, the cadences at which the power is output is dramatically different. Road riding, unless very steep (and not enough gears available) you can basically decide the cadence you wish to ride at, again, it is so steady. In mountain biking, the cadences vary dramatically, with a large chunk of the high powered efforts at low cadences (50-70). I guess this is a lot of the out of the saddle steep climbs, but again, a thing that my road riding had not prepared myself for properly. On the road, I do train at the slower cadences, but not at that power level – my Anaerobic, VO2Max efforts tend to be at the 80-90 range.

So what am I changing, without going into too much detail, more high powered steep climbs (not necessarily technical, I seem to handle those well), more 3-5 minute climbs and, if you read anything about my Cyprus racing, more training in relation to fast starts – clearing lactate etc…

Irish XC NPS Round 2

Mel and I missed the first round of the 2009 Irish XC NPS series but will be heading along to the second round held in Ballinastoe Forest on Sunday April 19th.

I don't know what the course will be like this year but last year it was very enjoyable with about 7 or 8 minutes of fireroad climbing per lap and the rest being natural and trail center type singletrack. Apart from a little kicker hill at the start there is nothing too technical or stressful so a great course to go out and try your first race!

My report from last year is available here.


More details available on the Irish XC website.

2009 Sunshine Cup Round 4 - UCI C1

It seemed like no time ago that Mel and I arrived in Cyprus for the Sunshine Cup, but Sunday was the final race in the 2009 series. On Thursday Mel and I traveled up to Oroklini to train on the course for the race. A very warm and sunny day greeted us on the course and pretty quickly we noticed the lack of shade – no problem, time to work on the tan :)
The course was probably the best of the series, a 7.5km mixture of fireroad, single track climbing, technical rocky climbing and, as usual for the Sunshine Cup, steep technical descending. This time though, the major descent was around two and a half minutes of white knuckle, stay off the breaks madness. Indeed, the first time around the lap I was wondering how I would ride it! Mostly, the initial apprehension was due to the sheer scale and length of the descents and from the second lap on, once you knew what to expect the descents were a blast.

For both of us, this trip was more about the training than the racing, our competition was a mixture of people peaking for these races and people training straight through them. To that end, last week both of us got a lot of good riding in and were both a little tired going into the race. Race morning arrived and I actually felt reasonably good – as I started my warmup, the rain clouds came in with a cold wind – the course was technical enough without the rain! As the 11am start time approached the 65 or so Elite Men congregated around the start area, the wind eased and the rain left us for the day – yes this IS the Sunshine Cup.

Shortly after 11 the race kicked off, a few missed pedals in front of me almost caused a pile up but the start loop was pretty well designed so we all settled into the race pretty quickly. Although not as bad as my last few races, I still wasn’t happy with my start. The first full lap went by in a blur with lots of jostling for position the whole way around - I mostly battled with guys from the German and Russian national teams. I seemed to be a lot stronger on the technical climbs (the full suspension S-Works Epic surely helped with that), descending roughly equal or better and then losing distance a bit on the flats/fireroads. Due to my lack of offroad riding over the winter, I thought the less technical end of things would be my stronger side, but I guess these guys did even less off road than me!


Halfway through my 3rd lap (Elite Men did 5 laps plus 1.5 start loops) I had the first of my two incidents. I had just passed two riders on a technical climb and was on a transitional fireroad section before the long descent when my front wheel unexpectedly washed out. With all the super technical descending, I fall on the freaking fireroad, it wasn’t even a fast section! Gashes on my elbow and knee pumped with pain and I contemplated calling it a day – I remounted and rode the descent, by the bottom I decided that there was no point calling it a day as the descents were too much fun and the cuts didn’t look too bad.

Climbing some singletrack

My next two laps were going well, I was catching up with the group that was fighting for 27th and felt pretty good. The punchy climbs had sapped a lot of my legs energy but I knew I could put in one more push to the finish. I rounded the top of the course with about 5 km to go, when disaster struck. Pshh, pshh, pshh – the front tire was slashed and Stan wasn’t up to the job. I started into the descent with about 10psi in the front tire but a few yards later it was obvious that things were not so good. I had a CO2 so I waited to a section where the wheel would be spinning well and inflated the tire in the hope that the whole would plug. No luck – damn. I rode/ran what I could on the way back but cursed as rider after rider nipped by. I lost 7 positions as I made my way back to the start/finish, and almost worse, lost out on the chance on riding those descents one last time.



Annoyed, I arrived back at the start finish – had I not had the puncture, I would have finished around 11 minutes down on the winner (about 10% off their speed).

Summing up, the course was great and the racing tough – the cuts meant I had a pretty sleepless night last night (there was one exact position I could lye) and the flat was a bit of a dampener, but I got great training and racing out here and at least I only had one race puncture, and it was on the last lap. I finished up 18th in GC for the Cup (the puncture cost my 3 places) but plan to return next year and make some improvements :)

Results for the race are available here and there is a report available here.

A special thanks to Fredrick from the Kalavasos bike station for helping us in so many ways over the last three weeks. Also, Cycleways, Specialized, KCNC and TorQ – for allowing us to ride on the best equipment available and keep our energy levels topped up. Thanks!

2009 Sunshine Cup Round 3 - UCI C1

Another weekend, another race – I could get used to this. Last weekend it was the third round of the Cyprus Sunshine Cup and we were competing just outside Limassol around the ancient ruins of Amathous. The course was a hilly affair with almost all of it on singletrack. Tough short climbs and technical descents where the name of the game – you always had to be very careful and focused, a few inches either side of the trail and you would easily washout or crash. Although not extreme, it was probably one of the more technical courses that I have ridden in that there were very few sections for you to relax on – falling on more pointy rocks was not on my todo list.


Due to the nature of the course, the orgainizing committee decided to split the men and women elite races with Mel starting at the ungodly hour of 9am. This did mean however that I would be able to take a few snaps of her race and visa versa (600 or so in total taken). I'll leave Mel to talk about her race. About 70 minutes before my race I started preparing for my warmup. We spend the 20 minutes before the race start being gridded (not like in Ireland where you roll up to the line 2 minutes before the start).

Dust rises as we descend the first singletrack section

At 12pm, the race hammered up the start loop – a short tarmac climb that quickly turns into fireroad, followed by horribly rutted fireroad and then single track for most of the rest of the race. As usual in this series, my start was terrible – I was gridded around 30th but slipped back into the 40s by the time I was half way around the first main lap and queuing to get into singletrack. This is something I am working on!

Emil Lindgren followed by Christoph Soukup

Climbing behind an ISD rider

I rode the course pretty well having no spills and enjoyed a few battles along the way. I actually enjoyed the race a lot which in some ways tells me that I wasn't pushing hard enough, which I knew – but still, a long while ago when I decided to come here for these races I had planned on 'training' through the races and using them as high intensity workout. That was my plan, but it's still tough not to be going faster when you are in the race. Still – a season from February to October is a long long season.



I finished up the race midpack passing 4 riders on my last lap (last lap was the same time as my first – hmmm, that should not be happening) and felt that I could keep on riding at the same pace. Guess that says my endurance is good but the high end is not there yet.

Anyway, this weekend is the final round in Voroklini – Mel and I rode the course today and I'm excited.


Full results are available here.

MTB Videos from Ireland

There has been a massive increase in the number of high quality well made MTB movies coming out of Ireland. This one is from a pump track in St. Annes Park.


Chuckies Trails from Victor Lucas on Vimeo.

I'm really looking forward to see what the Break the Cycle video will look like.

Here is the trailer:


Break the Cycle Trailer from Andy Yoong on Vimeo.

Another from Andy Yoong that I seen at the Wee Adventure Film Festival.


Colin Ross rides Cave hill (short version) from Andy Yoong on Vimeo.

A change in the weather

I went riding from this:

To this, in a day:

It's actually pretty amazing - I have not seen this much snow around Dublin City before - in the mountains, yeah, but down where I live the snow sat all day. Ireland's weather is getting more like that of the continent... I hope we get the long hot summer.